


Tastes Like Thunder

by NoContractTermination



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon Universe, Character Study, Enemies to Friends, Friends With Benefits, Friendship/Love, Hand Jobs, M/M, Oral Sex, Rimming, Some Plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-08
Updated: 2017-07-08
Packaged: 2018-11-29 07:17:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11435877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoContractTermination/pseuds/NoContractTermination
Summary: It takes Yuta a lot of failed takes to learn that it's okay to love freely and in moderation. Doyoung reminds him to stop and smell the flowers along the way.





	Tastes Like Thunder

"You’re really pushing it this week, Doyoung," Yuta said, leaning against the doorframe of their shared room in the hostel. Doyoung was curled up on the floor in the corner with his phone plugged into the outlet, his cheek smushed in on his knuckles. From his spot, Doyoung glared up at Yuta defiantly, a look he had reserved just for Yuta. 

Doyoung’s life seemed incredibly tiring. If Doyoung was anything, he was _discerning_ , in an overt, forward way that couldn't settle, constantly scraping the edges of this big vat of the human condition. Of course, Doyoung always had the energy to rip Yuta a new one on public broadcast. And both of them were clearly getting fed up, judging from the way Doyoung almost spat out indecency in the middle of filming NCT Life. Twice.

"I know," Doyoung said coolly, his lips pursed but somehow still sticking out in that pretty way they did, forming a little pout.

Yuta slid the door closed behind him. His fingers lingered on the frame, and Doyoung’s pupils looked like they quivered in response. 

"If we want to get through this," Yuta started, trailing off and expecting Doyoung to fill in the gaps. 

And, as if to provoke him even more, Doyoung didn’t. 

Yuta sighed, starting again, his shoulder aching from practice as he leaned back against the wall. "What are you gonna do about it?"

Doyoung gave this due thought while inspecting Yuta’s face the way he always read situations. They were alone, so right now Yuta _was_ the entire situation, and Yuta didn’t mind that at all. Rarely did he catch Doyoung’s attention; it always came so fast and so intensely, like a spiraling bullet, that slowing it down without practiced concentration was almost impossible. Yuta, though, decided he wanted something out of Doyoung at that moment. And, judging by the way Doyoung swung his legs around him and stood up square in his spot, the desire didn’t go unmatched.

By sheer determination of will, Yuta steamrolled toward his goals. For Yuta, things would eventually come together. There was no use in forcing the puzzle pieces to fit, as long as you knew the general direction of the end result. Carefully planned steps and attention to detail were for people like Doyoung, who had at least by now built a repertoire of social transactions so large he seemed almost like a human being. Like travelers, Doyoung followed a map, and Yuta followed the stars. 

When Doyoung approached in one of these moods, though, the sky went dark. Their relationship was the one thing in the world that felt impossible to navigate, like a flat field with no end in sight. 

"What are _you_ gonna do about it?" Doyoung replied. His voice was breathy but not weak, and beautiful in a way.

In an endless field, though, no direction was wrong.

Yuta pushed off the wall and held Doyoung in place by his lanky arms and surged forward to kiss him. Doyoung always made it hard for Yuta to spread his lips open, but Yuta was unrelenting in this, wetting Doyoung’s lips with his tongue until it was almost impossible not to let it slip past. Doyoung wriggled restlessly, his hands unsure of where to touch, settling on Yuta’s hips, then running across his abdomen, then up his chest, across his biceps, and the frantic movements were hot, almost as hot as Doyoung’s dick straining against his boxers and digging into the jeans wrapped around Yuta’s thighs.

"So we’re doing this today," Doyoung concluded when he pulled back slightly, out of breath and eyes wild. 

"Yup," Yuta replied. Doyoung grinned all toothy and wicked, making Yuta whirl both of them around and shove Doyoung against the wall, licking into him again and tasting all the nooks of Doyoung’s mouth and how the hell he got so many unnecessary words out of it in one day. It was delicious: fresh and minty from just having brushed his teeth, the bitter zing of mouthwash still collected in some of the corners.

Doyoung groaned as Yuta took his time lapping at him, his arms glued at his sides and surprisingly obedient under Yuta’s hands.

"Stay," Yuta said quietly and sunk to his knees.

—

For some people, it was hard to fall in love. It took Yuta a long time to learn this after years of getting in way over his head with everyone to the point that just surviving was draining. It took Yuta a long time to learn that being loved didn’t mean falling in love. 

Yuta loved people. Yuta’s first crush was some girl in middle school who lived next door and carpooled to travel soccer with him. She was spunky, kind of short, and always wore basketball shorts to school. There was a lot of love in him to give, maybe, because it was easy to devote his entire being to someone for no reason other than that they were incredible. But there was always this inevitable emptiness afterward, like being filled with a void of inadequacy that pressed against all his walls and only seemed to expand until he might explode. 

The only thing of value Yuta had to give was love and affection, so it seemed logical that a similar sort of attention might fill that void. That was what began the process of constructing Nakamoto Yuta. Maybe through _sheer determination of will_ people might look his way, and maybe then their attention would plug all the holes through which love seemed to be seeping out of him like leaky plumbing. And one day, it maybe paid off in meeting Doyoung, the first person to say hi to him after he joined SM.

Later, when Yuta would ask why Doyoung spoke to him at that time, Doyoung would think back, as if jogging through his memory bank, and come up to say, "Dunno. You looked lonely."

They weren’t close at first. Or, maybe Doyoung was trying. 

There were a lot of people at SM who were quite unlike anyone Yuta had ever met before. There were people like Jaehyun who were so impeccable they couldn’t be real. There were the Taeyongs, who had several sides to them that you thought were mutually exclusive but somehow all came together to form one unbelievable, outstanding person who lived that reality so thoroughly he sometimes lost himself in it. 

Doyoung— well, there were a lot of things about Doyoung that were different, like he was just trying to imitate what it might be like to live. 

"Hi," Doyoung would say in a voice equally cheerful and ominous. He would come sit down next to Yuta in SUM cafe while Yuta had his headphones on and clearly exuded malignity, point out a word on the form Yuta was filling out, and utter brightly, "You spelled that wrong, by the way. It’s with a ㅋ, not a ㄱ."

Yuta, who couldn’t settle for less than perfect, would make a hard little scribble and thrust the form at Doyoung’s chest. " _You_ wanna fill it out for me then?"

Doyoung shrugged. "Sure," he replied, starting right where Yuta left off. He made no comments about Yuta’s zodiac sign or nationality, nothing on his age, nothing to indicate he was doing any more than filling out a form Yuta couldn’t be assed to finish. Doyoung’s quick scribbles provided the background to which Yuta closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair, drumming his fingers to whatever music came up on Melon. "Here," Doyoung said, and Yuta blinked one eye open in response. "I think that might’ve been illegal."

"Whatever," Yuta replied, and Doyoung grinned.

"I’m Doyoung, by the way."

"Yuta," Yuta said, offering his hand.

Doyoung took it and let out a bright but hesitant laugh. "I know."

They weren’t close at first. Their relationship was bristly, like it could crumble with a look in the wrong direction. They developed an awkward rapport through Yuta unintentionally welcoming Doyoung’s weird, unsolicited appearances because Doyoung’s criticism stroked Yuta’s constant need to improve. And likewise, Doyoung gravitated toward Yuta who was the only one who wouldn’t brush him off for being too prickly. If day 1 at SM was crash landing onto a strange island populated by even stranger creatures, day 2 was realizing that ultimately, this was a test of last man standing. Your weapon was your talent. Your survival skills hard work. A few trainees ruled the island, and one of them was Doyoung. He sang like his life truly depended on it.

They all practiced together from time to time simply because there weren’t enough practice rooms in the building, and Doyoung sang like someone stabbed him yesterday and he was still nursing the wound. He sang like he longed for something from another time or in a dimension he could see into but never reach. You could feel his yearning from miles away. You could cut through his desire with a knife. Doyoung, regardless of the cool condescension he emanated, seemed to enjoy the prospect of getting the most out of life. And maybe it was just that which prevented Yuta from ever rejecting him.

There was something about Doyoung that was familiar but incredible. And, like an old, toxic friend, that beautiful, bittersweet admiration began bubbling up inside Yuta again at the most inconvenient time in his life. He was already empty, so it pulled from his emotional shell like he was now in debt and had to take out a mortgage for the love that started trickling out of him again whenever he was around Doyoung. 

Yuta still didn’t know how to love freely and in moderation. And frankly, it terrified him.

Relationships ebbed and flowed; it was simply a matter of life. Doyoung, too, learned boundaries by pushing them and developed friendships. People like Taeyong, Jaehyun, Ten were starting to accept him as one of their own, and Doyoung, though still sometimes awkward, began to loosen his molds. They morphed into one big group of boys with a superficial understanding of each other and on a deeper level the understanding of suffering. 

Distancing himself from Doyoung wasn’t purposeful or ill-intentioned. It just sort of happened. That was all. And yet, for Yuta, Doyoung would always have a special look reserved.

Out of this was born the development of Doyoung and Yuta as a dynamic rather than as two separate entities simply shaping each other by way of liquids, spreading to fill the container they occupied.

—

It was probably unfair, then, that Yuta, years later, was the first one to demand, "Why do you hate me?" from Doyoung. 

Doyoung didn’t hate. It was that straightforward. The way Doyoung would push, prod, bend, break, and put himself back together before going right out there and trying once again— a person who had hate at the center of their heart couldn’t bring themselves to do that. And Doyoung’s love for giving love itself made Yuta feel all warm and quivery, like he was so close to something he thought might finally fill his heart, yet still so far. Like Doyoung was for some reason purposely keeping it from him. And Yuta, who was not sensitive, whose role was to smile and grit his teeth and work through it all with boyish tenacity, didn’t know how to ask.

"I don’t…?" was Doyoung’s inevitable response, and Yuta rolled his eyes. He had extra vocal lessons with Doyoung after dance, and Doyoung would not let up about Yuta’s intonation. Which was good enough by anyone else’s standards, but for some reason Doyoung was looking for perfection today. Actually, Doyoung was always like this, especially with Yuta. Doyoung scoffed and looked up and off to the side, toward some invisible place he went when he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. "You think because I make you stay for extra practice I _hate_ you?"

Yuta kicked the music stand, and Doyoung watched it as it wobbled. "Obviously I don’t mean _hate_ ," Yuta mumbled, "but—"

"I know what you mean, hyung," Doyoung interrupted, putting down the music and staring at Yuta with his complete, undivided attention. For how chilly Doyoung’s looks always were, though, they weren't unpleasant to look at. "Look, you’re handsome," Doyoung said flatly. "I’ve met tons of you before. You’re gonna debut, and things will be fine." 

That sidelined him. Doyoung had a way with making his compliments sound worse than his criticisms, and Yuta responded with a scowl. "Thanks," he muttered, and Doyoung raised his eyebrows.

"You don’t impress me," said Doyoung simply. 

"What does that have to do with anything?" Yuta snapped. 

Doyoung rolled his eyes. "You want to impress people," Doyoung explained, looking Yuta up and down. The scrutiny was both offensive and curious, much like the rest of Doyoung’s existence. "I’ve never met someone who wants attention as much as you."

"Is that why you don’t give me any then?" Yuta blurted out, crossing his arms. A wry smile at this point felt like protection, but the look on Doyoung’s face wasn’t confrontational. His eyes were wide, eyebrows furrowed, tilted up like a little mountain. He looked bewildered, like he was just beginning to understand the situation. And the short pause in the conversation gave Yuta room to start immediately regretting everything he’d just said, like showing that he was openly hurt gave Doyoung a part of him he could never get back.

"But… aren’t I giving you attention?" Doyoung said finally. Yuta blinked and looked away. "Here? Now?"

"You’re fixing my pitch," Yuta said flatly, and Doyoung pursed his lips as if trying to learn a new word or memorize a grocery list. 

After an uncomfortable silence, Yuta went back to humming the adlib he’d been practicing. They were clearly getting nowhere, and if there _was_ going to be a rift driven between the lot of them, it made sense that it would be Doyoung and Yuta. He should never have confronted Doyoung. He’d let emotions get the better of him, another side effect of a love that ballooned out far too rapidly. Somewhere inside, it felt like a dream shattering instead of just slowly fading away. It was bound to have happened at some point, but now it was messy and he had to pick up the pieces. Doyoung sighed distractedly and leaned against the foamy sound insulators on the door, looking off to the side again and focusing on something in the distance. 

Yuta cleared his throat. "Let’s just get this finished up so we can go home, okay?" he said exasperated, but Doyoung was silent. When Yuta glanced at him, something about Doyoung felt small, like he’d shrunken inside his body and now there was nothing holding his skin up. Like if you touched him he might collapse in on himself.

After a deep breath, Doyoung murmured, "Jaehyun always says I'm the best at criticizing people." His voice was too even, like he was detaching himself from his words, yet it still held that familiar little edge, dangerous and right up against your neck. "And that I should put it to use." It sounded disproportionate, like a tiny little snapping turtle. Like Doyoung was trying to threaten him but had little will to proceed. Maybe this was Doyoung overcompensating for something. Maybe this was Doyoung protecting himself.

Yuta’s shoulders slumped. A sudden wave of exhaustion hit him and filled his entire being, infiltrating the pathways into his brain. Suddenly, he couldn’t think of what to say, or if there was anything even to say. Nothing seemed quite substantial enough to reach out and catch the hand Doyoung was offering him. It was like they were both lost in space, and even if they found each other, they were still hopelessly alone in this vast universe. This was years of walls, years of protection peeling down layer by layer, and doing all that deconstructing was tiring as hell.

"I know I seem harsh and overly negative," said Doyoung, his arms crossed over his chest defensively. But Yuta was no longer armed. He felt naked at a stalemate. "But at this point," Doyoung continued, "I don’t really know how to be anything else."

It was vulnerability, this state that Doyoung had so delicately unlatched. "That’s— that’s not true," Yuta said lamely, and Doyoung gave him a sharp look. Yuta backed down sheepishly, because he really had no basis for saying that when that was the premise this conversation started on. 

"You want to impress people," Doyoung repeated, softer this time. "And I want to help you." He wrung his hands a little and pursed his lips more. "You know, meeting you, it was like— finally, someone who won’t let up. Maybe I could help someone for once. Someone who wants to get better no matter what."

Yuta laughed a little tiredly. "Sorry for disappointing you, I guess."

"No— I," said Doyoung, reaching forward for Yuta’s arm but flinching back at the last moment. Yuta’s gaze darted toward Doyoung’s hand; it would probably feel warm and dry. He’d have cold fingers with how skinny they were. "I’m sorry. I misjudged you."

_And I, you_ Yuta thought of saying, but his voice was stuck in his throat. It was like they both saw each other exactly how they wanted the world to see themselves, and therefore thought they were making each other happy. Yuta hated admitting his vulnerability, so Doyoung thought he had none. Not a bad impression to make, but no matter how hard Yuta tried to keep the card house standing, it would eventually come toppling down. Meanwhile, Doyoung kept adding cards, thinking he was helping. 

Yuta hated admitting his vulnerability, but for some reason he felt a little less empty inside now, like even if the card house fell, now Doyoung was here to help him put it back together again. He gave Doyoung a little smile instead, and the corners of Doyoung’s lips perked up a little into his cheeks. 

—

Doyoung was the one who taught him that, contrary to popular belief, love was not something you fell in. Love was not the hard work, or the good face, or the inherent talent. Love was not admiration for that, but deeper. Love was a commitment that took an enormous amount of effort, more than you could even imagine. Love engendered heartbreak, compromise, and heartbreak all over again. 

"Sounds tiring," Yuta said, though he didn’t think deeply about it until way later. This happened after debut, after they were all living together and Yuta still felt a wall between him and the others, consequences of years of building that wall himself. Especially since the current lineup was a haphazard assortment of people with whom Yuta, frankly, had no idea how to interact. Taeyong was busy, well, being Taeyong, and Doyoung only came over to visit sometimes. Youngho, Ten, and Hansol where nowhere to be found, and, not for the first time but for the time effects were most prevalent, Yuta felt unarguably lost. There were discussions to add Doyoung to the lineup, but nothing was finalized. Doyoung, of course, seemed untroubled by the turmoil. Or if he was, he did a hell of a job hiding it.

It wasn’t that Yuta didn’t try to change. He really did. Taeyong even complimented him for opening up to Sicheng so… _aggressively_. "Is that how you’re gonna put it?" Yuta said with a fake scoff, and Taeyong cuffed his shoulder lightly, laughing. "All my efforts? Aggressive?"

"I mean, I’ve never seen you like this before," said Taeyong. "Taking so much initiative. It’s… a little awkward? But it's nice. Keep doing what you do."

Sicheng was a first class mystery. It was like you got the feeling he knew you deep down but he never did or said anything to prove it. He was someone you could spend hours rambling to, and he’d just occasionally repeat after you or say, "Oooh," so that was how Yuta ended up airing some of his inner grievances to Sicheng, sprinkled throughout hundreds of conversations about videogames, anime, music, food, the like. It was like opening up without having to experience the consequences of actually opening up.

Of course, then Sicheng would sometimes blindside you by walking past and suddenly going, "I think you’re a sensitive person, Yuta-hyung." But it felt nice in a way, knowing that someone was thinking about you, if not for the dance skills, the face, the hard work, the sharp wit, but simply for being _sensitive_.

Yuta decided he’d try with Taeil, too. And Mark, given the opportunity. He didn’t have to open up all the way. Just a little bit so that things weren’t so rocky. So that was how he found himself half listening to some chick flick Taeil insisted on watching and then ended up falling asleep before the opening credits even finished. Doyoung was there with a batch of homemade muffins and a bunch of dried food from his mom that they were probably never going to end up cooking. Yuta draped his jacket over Taeil gingerly. 

"It _is_ tiring," Doyoung replied, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly. "Love." 

Doyoung, despite everything, was honest. Doyoung built layers and layers of self-protection quite meticulously, but under it all, he was a good guy. He harbored no grudges, held no false pretenses, and wanted the best for everyone, and was just stumbling through life like everyone else in his own awkward, gangly kind of way. Yuta could respect that. 

Despite their differences, one thing Doyoung and Yuta shared was a pretty solid mechanism for blocking all the good things out, letting all the bad things in, and then keeping them there with no hopes of escape. Doyoung was probably still thinking about the way Jaehyun basically called him good for nothing besides being critical.

"Then why do people do it?" Yuta said with a twist of the side of his mouth. The fans loved that. Doyoung probably hated it. His tastes followed a pattern that was almost too easy to place, but the inherent honesty in that made it charming. Doyoung never tolerated things he couldn’t stand. For what it was worth, though, Doyoung was softer now, less abrasive, and Yuta for the first time felt the distinct warmth of having watched Doyoung grow and change over the years. It was a heavy feeling, though not for being sad or even nostalgic, but heavy with a load of implications, like responsibilities. It felt like, for as much of himself as he’d given away, he’d taken a little bit of Doyoung for himself, too. Or maybe it was Doyoung who gave that part to him.

Surprisingly, Doyoung glanced at Yuta then with wide eyes, tracing the line of his smirk for a hard moment before jerking his gaze forward again. "Beats me."

The year was 2016. The month was November. Maybe in an effort to change, after that falling-out-and-semi-making-up with Yuta, maybe to balance out the asceticism of his character, Doyoung had recently acquired a sense of humor. 

It was all part of his process of attempting to become a human being, Yuta would joke, and Doyoung would just flick him in the forehead. But once Doyoung started using that line on himself, for some reason, Yuta got angry. It didn’t suit Doyoung, prickly, walled-off Doyoung, to talk about himself the way only Yuta knew Doyoung sometimes actually thought about himself: humorless, unaware, and afraid.

Normally, Doyoung was sure. Normally, Doyoung had a very heightened, very even, very stubborn sense of justice that he felt compelled to exercise at every opportunity. But given the few conversations they’d had after that time at the studio about vulnerability and strength, hate and love, it made perfect sense: if Doyoung was the first to point out his own flaws, no one else could make it worse. It took a certain kind of strength that Yuta didn’t have, being that unapologetic. "Doyoung is like glass," Taeyong once said, and every single one of them knew it, but no one did a damn thing about it.

Yuta hate watching Doyoung never seriously attempt to stand up for himself when he could be protective of the other members to the point of cruelty. It felt like Doyoung was giving himself away, settling for less than he had to. "Practicing for Limitless made my body hurt all over," Doyoung complained in that white room, twisting and wiggling his arms, and Yuta scoffed. 

"I felt fine, though?" Yuta said, and Taeyong laughed. "Maybe you’re stiff?"

When Yuta got mad, he said and did stupid things. He pushed people away passive-aggressively. It was better than getting upset, or worse yet, crying. He was mad because he’d _seen_ Doyoung practice all those years and steadily improve. Of course Doyoung’s body hurt; he practiced for hours to nail the same moves it took Taeyong minutes to remember. Yuta couldn’t help but watch sometimes, mesmerized by the way Doyoung’s body had its own way of communicating, majestic with the sheer weight of which it moved. His limbs did not fly, like Sicheng's and Ten’s. His presence was not powerful, like Jaehyun’s, or maybe Yuta’s himself. Doyoung’s arms moved like weights he overcame, want being the pure force driving him forward. It was as if you could see the work he put in powering his limbs along. He had a grace with which he knew his limits but still aimed beyond them, and that in itself was beautiful. After years of knowing Doyoung, it was easy to spot his frustration. And yet he continued tirelessly, reminiscent of the hours they’d spend together rehearsing the same runs in the studio over and over again until Yuta’s tones stopped wobbling.

Doyoung grimaced at him a little, stretching it into a smile, and the broadcast went on.

Doyoung was incredible. Doyoung was amazing, and it was infuriating that the world couldn’t see that. Yet somewhere deep down, Yuta knew he wasn’t any better because he couldn’t bring himself to admit that to Doyoung’s face. Admiration made way for love. Love came with vulnerability. Yuta had learned this from Doyoung. Saying it out loud made it more real. And at the time, Yuta didn’t know how to reconcile that. He didn’t want Doyoung to get involved _again_. The worst possible outcome would be to destroy everything they’d already built, through weird, difficult communication and a lot of rough patches they would never have gotten through if not together.

It was another one of those late nights in the practice room where Mark, shaken out of his stupor, finally went to turn on the lights at a solid 2AM. 

Yuta had since replayed the day it all started in his head thousands of times, trying to put the little bits and pieces together anyway to frame the circumstances of everything that happened from there on out. Trying to piece it together though felt like trying to make batter from nothing but eggs and water. There was way too much residual emotion and not enough recollection of what even brought them to that point. 

Doyoung, at that moment, happened to dart in immediately afterward and look on disapprovingly while Mark scribbled something down in his notebook. Yuta was sprawled out in a state of detachment as the light hit his eyes.

Practicing in the dark was nice sometimes because Yuta didn’t have to see his body and be constantly reminded of the sense of self he didn’t have. Letting his muscles move automatically to imitate the choreography he could do in his sleep felt cathartic in a robotic kind of way. It reminded him he didn’t need to have a sense of self in this industry, just determination and some sort of consistency. If not anything extraordinary, at least he had survival skills in this hell of a place.

That wasn’t, though, how Nakamoto Yuta operated. Being constantly surrounded by people who were better than you at everything you stood for— even better than you at being _you_ , felt jarring, like suddenly he didn’t deserve to define himself by everything he'd previously known. And they were always improving at whatever they did, while Yuta didn’t even have a thing he wanted to improve at. He was empty, and all the hard work in the world times zero was still zero.

Mark turned on the light, and Yuta was a mess. He lookedlike a mess, and Doyoung didn’t spare him a second glance. He was sweating so hard his sweat was sweating, he could barely feel his legs, and his shoes were agitating an angry blister from one of his new pairs of boots last week, and it was definitely bleeding through his socks by this point. 

Doyoung peeked in, looked pointedly at Mark, and said, "Mark, go home." 

Then, silence. Yuta looked at Mark. Mark looked at Yuta. Doyoung stood staring ahead, unmoving. Nothing Doyoung did was unplanned.

"And abandon me here?" Yuta croaked into the emptiness, his voice feeling like sandpaper crawling its way through his dehydrated throat. 

Doyoung finally shot him a sharp look and turned to Mark again. "It’s late," he tried, and Yuta rolled his eyes, catching Doyoung’s gaze on the followthrough. Mark, sensing tension, snuck out of the room at some point during that exchange, and Doyoung’s hand was already on the light switch. But Yuta clearly wasn’t budging. Doyoung turned the light off and was silent for so long Yuta thought he’d left him and was just about to go back to dancing when Doyoung said, "Yuta-hyung."

In the dark, it sounded so much louder and right in his face. Something electric fluttered through his belly and froze him up just enough to keep him standing. 

"What do you think you're doing?" Doyoung said, his voice even and sharp. 

"Practicing," Yuta replied airily. "Trying to wrangle Mark into it too, but—"

"Well. Stop it," Doyoung said hard but almost flustered as if he didn’t know what he wanted to say. 

They hadn’t been talking to each other recently, which just exasperated the situation. Yuta wanted the old Doyoung, the one that he could justify hating because Doyoung hated him, the one who never had anything nice to say but still exuded kindness in the most peculiar way that only Yuta understood, back. This new Doyoung felt so generous. It felt like his warmth was being shared, the love he had he was giving to everyone. Yuta couldn’t bring himself to admit he wanted the weird, special bond between them they had before back. Yuta would _never_ admit that every time Doyoung let himself be the butt of the joke, Yuta felt this unfamiliar urge to protect him, to keep him to himself, and what Yuta didn’t understand on a physical, concrete level annoyed him to no end.

On a more surface level, Doyoung had something he was working toward, and Yuta envied that. It was envy, admiration, possessiveness, protectiveness, all bundled up into one strange, complicated emotion. And, like it or not, someone had tried to explain this to him before, months ago, when he was watching a chick-flick and Taeil was sleeping on the couch.

Yuta kicked the floor so that it squeaked, a hint of a smirk on his face. "Why?" he said quietly. "Why don’t you tell me to go home too?"

Doyoung sighed something long and tired, dragging it out from somewhere deep inside him. "I don’t have time to worry more about you than the other members," he said. 

They were words Yuta was prepared to hear and yet still hated more than anything. He wanted— no, needed to be everyone’s everything. Doyoung presented the biggest challenge so far, and thus Yuta was fated to pursue it. That was all. 

"And I don’t want to _have_ to," Doyoung continued in a small voice, cautiously closer.

Yuta said nothing and instead just felt Doyoung’s presence this time, like when you look around in the dark enough and your eyes gradually get used to it. He wouldn’t be able to mistake Doyoung for gone ever again because once you noticed it, his presence was huge and stern, a pillar that held up old temples that weren’t ever the main attraction but had beauty in their functional intricacy. 

Maybe it was because Yuta so coveted the spotlight that he ended up so ironically attracted to someone like Doyoung, who barged his way into Yuta’s story and became the main character. Things always happened that way.

"Take care of your goddamn self like you always do," Doyoung said, putting a hand on Yuta’s shoulder a little awkwardly. "I know you’re strong. And I know you have feelings, too. That just makes you stronger."

They weren’t used to existing like this. This was uncharted territory, for Doyoung to shy away from something he didn’t understand. There was a playfulness in Yuta’s tone that overshadowed their every interaction, but Doyoung was pulling away from that this time, going for something more. 

Yuta had been snapping at Doyoung out of a need to distract himself from… everything, but had Doyoung been avoiding him? He certainly wasn’t practiced at it, and everything he did was so unsubtle it all hit Yuta over the head at that very moment: the way he didn’t look at Yuta, the way he buried himself in his own work too. Maybe that was why he even had to turn the lights off, to save some dignity or nerves. 

"That’s why I love you," continued Doyoung, squeezing Yuta’s shoulder a bit.

Yuta was getting skinnier, and he knew Doyoung could feel that. Maybe that was why Doyoung's thumb was lingering there on the end of his collarbone and making a jolt run through his entire body. "I know you do," Yuta said with a playful grin, ruining everything, and Doyoung laughed and pulled Yuta forward into a hug. Doyoung was deceptively strong, and Yuta might have anchored himself by grabbing unnecessarily tightly onto Doyoung’s waist and breathing in the skin of his neck. That is, if anchoring meant strapping yourself in for a long ride. 

There was no way Doyoung couldn’t feel Yuta’s lips against his neck. The spot under them was getting hot from either Doyoung’s skin or Yuta’s breath or a mix of both. Doyoung had just showered in one of the locker rooms and smelled like that little travel set of lavender wash goods he stole from the hotel chain they stayed at regularly when SM sent them abroad. Doyoung had a whole stockpile of them in his duffel bag, most of which he lent to Taeyong who hated being dirty while eating for some reason but always forgot to bring wash stuff to COEX. It was a good, nostalgic smell that reminded Yuta of all the late night practices, the five minute showers in hotel rooms, the nights where they got 3 hours of sleep and were carted off to rehearsals and filming, the nights where they stupidly spent those hours talking gibberish instead of sleeping if the managers were lucky enough to room two insomniacs together that trip. Taeil was the worst offender, but Doyoung could hold his own, too. And later, it would remind Yuta of now.

Doyoung turned his head slowly and carefully, keeping Yuta’s pressure on his skin almost perfectly constant. Doyoung had a way with being in discreet control of himself and his surroundings, so Yuta did what had to be done and lurched forward, latching onto Doyoung’s neck completely unexpectedly. This made Doyoung gasp and grip Yuta’s shoulders harder out of sheer surprise. If it weren’t pleasant, though, Doyoung would have had no problem pushing Yuta away. But he didn’t. 

"Let me know if you want me to stop," Yuta breathed, trailing soft kisses up Doyoung’s neck and jawline, and Doyoung gave the faintest nod before tempting Yuta by baring more of his neck for him. Yuta took the invitation and bit down lightly, and Doyoung let out a fluttery moan that sounded unbelievably sensual. Yuta pulled back with a labored breath and looked Doyoung in the eye, and Doyoung stared right back at him with a challenging glare. "Can I kiss you," Yuta said, and Doyoung puffed out a snort.

"You already did," he mumbled.

And Yuta brought their faces closer in response so that their noses were almost touching. Doyoung was holding his breath. "No, on the mouth, loser," Yuta whispered, and Doyoung replied by nodding and licking his lips maybe subconsciously. Yuta followed that tongue like a hawk as a shudder coursed through him when he leaned forward to press his lips to Doyoung’s.

Doyoung’s mouth was tightly closed, and Yuta’s was hanging open, relaxed, but Doyoung made no move to initiate. It was fine like this, though, just breathing into each other for a moment and finding their bearings. Here they were, in a darkened practice room, gearing up for a comeback, passing time since Mark had left, stalling for whatever reason, frozen in prescience like if they stayed here, tomorrow might never come. And Yuta still wanted to fucking kiss Doyoung. 

Yuta took a breath through the space between his lips and Doyoung’s, and he swiped his tongue against the seam of Doyoung’s mouth gently, as if saying _let me in_. 

Doyoung pulled away a short distance though not repulsed and gave Yuta a thoughtful stare. _Not until you let me in too_. Yuta wanted in Doyoung’s pants, and Doyoung wanted in Yuta’s heart, if not as a lover at least as a friend. Doyoung liked to be relied on, and thinking that Yuta didn’t need him was how they existed before this, pre-kiss. Yuta could very well take care of his damn self, but it wasn’t the same. He didn’t need Doyoung’s care, but he wanted his company. And for Doyoung, that was enough.

"Okay," Yuta said a little breathlessly, his forehead against Doyoung’s, and Doyoung laughed. "Okay," he repeated, more to himself than to Doyoung, and caught Doyoung’s little giggles in playful but insistent kisses, nipping at Doyoung’s lips, the corners of his mouth, flicking his tongue over Doyoung’s skin teasingly until Doyoung was aching for more too, blindly rushing forward every time Yuta pulled away. Doyoung gaped a little as he did this, his eyes fluttering shut, and Yuta finally humored him and took a bit for himself, too. Doyoung’s mouth tasted airy when Yuta slipped his tongue inside and nursed the back of his lips. 

Doyoung made a small, satisfied sound that made Yuta go warm, because no matter how much Doyoung let you knew he was happy, that he liked that, he could still sound so needy. His words would cut off in pretty little whines, and he became tense in an effort not to rut back for more. 

All that went straight to Yuta’s head. Right then was when he realized sex with Doyoung was probably going to be fantastic. Yuta was weak to that ever so sweet praise, and it seemed like everything Doyoung had been withholding before started tumbling out now. And Doyoung didn’t just tell you you were doing a good job, he showed you. He didn’t just let you know, he made you know. And it was all Yuta could do to chase every reaction with something even better and keep Doyoung coming back for more. 

So Yuta palmed the sides of Doyoung’s hips and felt around his joggers to his ass, which was keenly flat but that didn’t make it not a good ass; it was still fleshy and kneadable, and, oh, wow, okay, Doyoung was rocking against him as he groped Doyoung a little more insistently than intended, but that was okay if it made Doyoung like _this_. 

"Hyung," Doyoung breathed, and Yuta couldn’t help but moan a little at that sound. Doyoung’s voice was always melodic, but simpered and prepared. This now was teetering on the edge of something Doyoung wouldn’t be caught dead sounding like normally. And after hearing it, Yuta couldn’t get enough. Doyoung was losing control. He was granting Yuta that power. "Yuta— Y— _hyung_ ," Doyoung whined as they grinded against each other sloppily like teenagers. 

Yuta laughed and said lowly, "Wow, I’m really hard," like he was marveling at it just to get under Doyoung’s skin, and Doyoung bit his lip to suppress a squeak and kicked Yuta lightly in the shin. 

"Of course you are, about to come in your fucking pants, too," Doyoung spat out between gasps, and Yuta growled and spun Doyoung around by the shoulders and pressed his front up against the wall. This wasn’t as difficult as anticipated when Doyoung was nearly jelly in his arms. "Oh god," Doyoung moaned when his chest hit the mirror, which was too dark to see into anyway. 

"I will, and you’ll watch," Yuta said, cupping Doyoung through his boxers. Doyoung choked out a gasp and smacked the side of his fist into the mirror, torn between leaning into Yuta’s hand or grinding his ass against Yuta’s dick. 

He settled on the latter. He pushed back, _hard_ , making Yuta bite lightly into the back of Doyoung’s neck in response. Doyoung knew Yuta hated easy. Doyoung liked testing the limits, and Yuta liked playing along. Their dynamic was, against all odds, harmonious. 

Yuta slapped around clumsily with his hand before finding his way into Doyoung’s pants and underwear and stroking him skin to skin, and Doyoung cried out an unintentional " _Yuta_ —!" in response. 

Yuta smiled into his neck. Working for it made it all the more satisfying, regardless of how easily they were both stringing each other along. Yuta grunted and rut forward as Doyoung’s hands came back shakily to grip Yuta’s hips. Doyoung still had some semblance of control in his fingers, deft at the oddest of moments as they slipped into Yuta’s track pants and over top of his thighs. Yuta let out a shaky breath as Doyoung circled the base of his dick, which was basically wedged hard into the crack of Doyoung’s ass through his pants with how close Yuta was. "Come on, come for me," Doyoung half mumbled half breathed out, sweaty and a little delirious with his cheek pressed into the practice room wall. He traced the vein along the top side of Yuta’s dick while pressing it harder between his asscheeks, and that was it. 

The friction brought Yuta over the edge, and he came with a shout all over the inside of his pants and Doyoung’s hand, and Doyoung visibly tensed and shuddered as hot come coated the space between his fingers.

Yuta breathed hard while he came down, his hand somehow gripping the front of Doyoung’s thigh hard enough to leave marks. When Yuta blinked his eyes open, Doyoung was looking back at him with his lip trapped between his teeth again, desperate and messy as hell. For whatever reason, Yuta anchored Doyoung’s wrists where they currently were, behind his back and pressed right up against Yuta’s crotch, and he moved the hand on Doyoung’s thigh right back to Doyoung's dick. 

"I’m close," Doyoung warned a little brokenly, and Yuta hummed and took his time stroking Doyoung while feeling Doyoung’s fingers weak against him, clenching and unclenching around nothing. "I— I’m close, please, don’t stop," Doyoung babbled, somehow just deteriorating into a trail of please please _please_ while his voice, as intended, lost coalescence and wobbled through the room. If Doyoung was mouthy normally, it was nothing compared to now. And for once, Yuta loved it, a wrecked and delicious stream of "Fuck, hyung— fuck, I’m, oh god, I’m c—" that choked off when he came, almost collapsing with the intensity of it. The heave of breath, the high, almost silent scream was so hot Yuta almost froze completely if not for Doyoung convulsing in his arms, fucking up into his hands himself, chasing his orgasm. 

Yuta kissed Doyoung’s neck and shoulders with a gentleness he never knew he had as Doyoung panted in his arms. After a while, Yuta simply settled for resting his lips against the crook of Doyoung’s neck and looking curiously into the mirror, his eyes beginning to glow a little bit in the darkness.

It seemed like it took all Doyoung had to turn around and slide down against the wall until he was sitting, his legs spread unabashedly. "What are we doing?" Doyoung said.

Yuta felt surprisingly renewed. Funny how adrenaline could do that. He folded his legs crossed under himself and sat between Doyoung’s legs, reaching forward to wipe the come off the mirror but ending up just streaking it. Doyoung snorted. "Dunno," replied Yuta.

"What did we just do?" said Doyoung, still breathless.

"We fucked."

"Did we? I mean, there was no—"

"Dude, if we were both touching each other and we came, we fucked," Yuta said, and Doyoung seemed to accept this.

The body’s immediate descent into recovery mode after an orgasm tended to subdue the panic a little. Doyoung shifted and crawled over to the light switch, going up on his knees to turn it on. Yuta swore he went blind for a few seconds. They’d really benefit from a dimmer, for god’s sake.

Yuta still looked like a mess, but a better mess than before, even if it was completely psychological. He looked like a sexy mess, and even Doyoung was staring at him through the reflection a little dazedly. "What, never did anything wrong before, sweetie?" Yuta said, and Doyoung rolled his eyes.

"You wish," said Doyoung. "And—" he continued, faltering a little. Yuta unfolded his arms, leaning back on his hands and watching Doyoung wiggle back into his track pants. "This isn’t… wrong. We’re not wrong."

"Mm, I think company policy would beg to differ," Yuta replied, smiling up at Doyoung. "Though if you want, you know, we could… let this continue."

"Okay," Doyoung said, which wasn’t really an answer. 

They cleaned up in silence, which was when Yuta discovered where Taeyong kept all the Windex. Doyoung even emptied the trash for good measure. "Are you afraid?" Yuta said when they walked out of the building together, locking up behind them into the fresh cold of early winter. Yuta was watching Doyoung swing the trash bag around mindlessly.

"Yes," Doyoung murmured. "I’m honestly terrified."

Yuta grunted by way of reply. It was nearing 3 in the morning, and the streets were empty while the sidewalks were flooded eerily uninterrupted with the warm glow of street lamps. He was scared too, but it was pleasant. Sometimes the unknown was way better than being absolutely certain in the knowledge that you, and other people, were hurting.

"But I was just as scared before this, too," Doyoung added. "It wasn’t something I’d never thought of before. Us, I mean."

Yuta laughed loudly into the night and for once Doyoung didn’t shush him. "That’s it? Because somehow that didn’t feel like just a passing thought."

Doyoung pursed his lips and made his face dimpled and round. "Okay, it— _you_ were on my mind. More than I was comfortable with. Fuck you for noticing."

"Me? Oh, I just took what I wanted," Yuta said. "That’s how I roll."

"Extra," Doyoung muttered, and Yuta grinned, knowing Doyoung knew he was lying. He was protecting himself, but having a hard, unshakeable exterior was not unfamiliar to Doyoung, so he let it be. At this point, neither of them was ready. And that was okay. Yuta, at least, felt undeniably at peace.

—

Their relationship billowed like the ocean. It was always a clear but unpredictable swell from the bottom, where they were calm and alert, as cooperative as any pair of completely different people could be, to when some small disagreement, usually having more to do with some other member than them, disturbed the tide. They’d argue about Mark, about Sicheng, Donghyuk, things that had nothing to do with them but somehow insulted the very core of their being. Of course the arguments weren’t really about the subject of the actual conversation but more about asserting their needs without actually saying them out loud. Doyoung was usually the one who was "right," but Yuta always got offended by his delivery and made it into a much bigger deal than it already was. Doyoung hated when things weren’t fair and just, and Yuta had his own idea of fair that didn’t always conform to standardized norms of justice. It was an age-old dichotomy that could never be resolved. But maybe neither of them wanted it to.

Because the arguments, like the tides, always led to a break. Yuta broke first this time. It didn’t matter; it wasn’t like they were keeping track. Maybe Doyoung was. He seemed like the type.

Osaka was warm in the spring, and every year brought change. Spring was the season of birth, and Osaka would never be less than childhood memories and a fond friend. Bringing the members to Osaka was like introducing your college mates to your childhood best friend and hoping nothing went too horribly wrong. Everyone could tell that Yuta was on edge. He was over expecting them to do jack shit about it, though.

Doyoung became the one who made an effort, though. Their relationship didn’t have an excuse _not_ to change. Like fireflies trapped in a jar, they made something with the space they had. Even if their collisions were frantic, they allowed each other the entirety of the space. They needed it.

Yuta nosed the space right above where Doyoung’s boxers cinched his hips, and Doyoung sucked in a breath, scratching at the walls. Taeyong and Sicheng were still at the convenience store, and Taeil was showering. Yuta wanted to make Doyoung scream. 

When Yuta pulled Doyoung’s boxers down gingerly, Doyoung’s dick sprang up and Doyoung looked away as if embarrassed. Yuta laughed, and Doyoung’s skin flushed in blotches. "Really, Doyoung? How many times have we done this already," Yuta said, and Doyoung reached forward to flick Yuta’s forehead but ended up grabbing his hair instead when Yuta suddenly sucked the tip of Doyoung’s dick into his mouth.

" _Fuck_ ," Doyoung hissed, and Yuta smiled. "It’s— it’s bright in here," Doyoung said, but stopped Yuta when he reached for the lights. "N-no. It’s fine. Don’t."

Yuta hummed in approval, taking more of Doyoung into his mouth. They usually fucked in the dark, but for some reason the idea of being able to watch Doyoung this time sounded… appealing. Doyoung, though apprehensive, apparently felt the same. Yuta twisted his hand around the base of Doyoung’s dick and started bobbing his head, making Doyoung let out a low moan. 

Never in a million years would Yuta have imagined himself so experienced at sucking cock— or, Doyoung’s cock in particular, because by now, he knew exactly what Doyoung liked, exactly how to get him off quickly, exactly how to tease him until he begged. Doyoung loved the pressure of Yuta’s tongue flicking around while Yuta sucked hard at the same time, and Yuta always had to hold Doyoung’s hips back when he got his tongue involved. So he did just that, kneading Doyoung’s ass, which had started to grow on Yuta as quite possibly the best ass in the world, even with how skinny it was. 

Doyoung’s hand flew over his mouth just in time to muffle a loud whine, his dick twitching in Yuta’s mouth. When Yuta looked up at him, Doyoung was staring back, his eyes watering and his hand clamped tight over his mouth, fringe matted to his forehead. When his eyes went wild like that, Yuta usually pulled off and prolonged it if they had time. "How do you want to come, babe?" Yuta mumbled after sliding his mouth off Doyoung’s cock, and Doyoung shuddered as if willing himself to come down enough to make it last.

Yuta started touching himself lazily, waiting for Doyoung’s answer as Doyoung panted and seemed a little at odds with himself. When Yuta jerked off even alone in the shower, it was always to the image of Doyoung, and that was okay. His fantasies were his own, anyway, and he’d seen enough of Doyoung’s body to conjure it in his mind at will. Putting another face to it just felt weird after Yuta had already touched every inch of Doyoung greedily and felt the way Doyoung went taut when he came and knew exactly how it felt to have his own hands curled around Doyoung’s thighs and arms. 

"I— I want you to eat me out," Doyoung said finally, and Yuta groaned at the unexpected demand, bracing his forehead against Doyoung’s hip. Doyoung was a conniving little fucker. He knew how much Yuta liked his ass. "Why do you think I took a shower so early, idiot."

"You knew I’d come to you today," Yuta said unbothered, turning Doyoung around and leaving little bites across his hips.

Doyoung braced himself against the wall, and Yuta took no time in spreading Doyoung’s ass with his thumbs, making Doyoung moan. "I get what I want," Doyoung panted out, and Yuta kissed his entrance in response, sucking on it a little because it was so goddamn pretty. Doyoung whimpered high and needy, and oh, this was going to be way too easy.

When Yuta pressed the tip of his tongue against Doyoung’s hole and then flattened it against it, Doyoung jerked forward and Yuta had to hold Doyoung’s hips hard enough to bruise, rubbing circles into his ass and letting the warm skin on his inner asscheeks press against Yuta’s face. They were velvety and a little tacky at the same time from the shower and the moisture in the air, and Yuta wanted nothing more than to nuzzle against them and blow a raspberry or two, but maybe next time. Instead he concentrated on working Doyoung open, letting him relax with little hums while his tongue worked slow but insistent. 

" _Harder_ ," Doyoung blurted out after a gasp. "You can be rough. I want to feel it."

Yuta breathed in and shoved his hand into his pants unabashedly. Fuck, Doyoung begged for it all the fucking time, but it never had any less of an effect; Yuta was already half hard just from listening to Doyoung come apart. 

In response, Yuta forced his tongue in past the rim of Doyoung’s entrance while pulling on his own cock tight and slow, just like how Doyoung would be inside. And Doyoung choked back a sob, sliding down against the wall while Yuta licked around inside him until he was on his elbows and knees, legs bent but spread out against the floor. When Doyoung presented himself like this, boneless and spread apart, it made Yuta greedy as hell. 

Yuta pulled out and pressed a kiss to Doyoung’s tailbone before pushing back in deep so that his lips were right up against Doyoung’s skin, essentially tongue-fucking him in long thrusts that had Doyoung keening. And Yuta lapped at him as if he couldn’t get enough, sucking and licking in lewd slurps that were all he could hear.

"Please," Doyoung started whimpering again, and it was getting to a point where Doyoung could say that in the middle of filming or radio and Yuta would easily drop to his knees or bend Doyoung over a table. " _Please_ , hyung."

Yuta hummed, beckoning for Doyoung to continue. He was drooling; there was saliva everywhere. Looking at it coating Doyoung’s entrance, all wet in broad light made it exaggeratedly erotic in an almost porn-ish type way, but damn was Yuta feeling it. His cock throbbed; he wanted to fuck Doyoung, but they didn’t have lube, or time. 

"Keep going, make me come," Doyoung demanded, panting and turning his head to glare back at Yuta with his eyes glazed over with tears. 

Yuta grinned. Doyoung knew he couldn’t resist a challenge. Yuta teased Doyoung’s rim, ghosting his fingers over it lightly before shoving his tongue inside again. His hand darted around Doyoung’s hip to his cock, and Doyoung screamed and slapped both hands to his face and swallowed the rest of the sound so it came out like a tiny squeak.

And when Yuta tugged on Doyoung’s cock and thrust in again, Doyoung’s legs tensed and shook, his toes curling as he came all over Yuta’s hand and the floor underneath him _hard_ , rocking back on Yuta’s tongue and heaving in frantic, deep breaths for dear life.

"Hyung, _hyung_ — god, Yuta-hyung," Doyoung gasped while Yuta merely held him and Doyoung fucked himself through it, muffling intermittent moans into his fist. Yuta could still feel Doyoung’s cock spurting out come, which went straight to his dick imagining how intense Doyoung’s orgasm must’ve been.

Yuta only let go when Doyoung pulled himself off and whirled around, collapsing on top of Yuta and crushing their lips together. "Fuck," Yuta gasped into Doyoung’s mouth which, for once, was wide open for him and even sucking Yuta’s tongue into his mouth and playing with it sloppily. "I just ate your fucking ass," Yuta said hoarsely, and Doyoung hummed out a content sound. Yuta could see the appeal, and it wasn’t like Doyoung tasted bad, anyway.

Yuta was hard against Doyoung’s stomach, and Doyoung could feel it. He wobbled down Yuta’s body shakily and opened his mouth and tongued at Yuta’s cock lazily. Yuta jerked embarrassingly at the stimulation, and Doyoung grinned, satisfied, and wrapped his mouth around Yuta’s cock but made no motion to move.

"Fuck you, let me fuck your mouth," Yuta said with a groan, and Doyoung pulled off with a wicked smile, his lips already swollen.

" _Please_ ," he murmured, and Yuta grabbed Doyoung’s hair. Doyoung at least guided himself on Yuta’s cock, because with how frantic Yuta was, it probably would’ve taken him minutes to even make it into Doyoung’s mouth. Doyoung kept licking at him while Yuta adjusted himself so that he was on his knees and Doyoung in front of him, still staring up at him with a challenging gaze. 

Yuta could only be gentle for the first thrust. Once Doyoung swallowed around him, Yuta started fucking his mouth without mercy, snapping his hips forward into the heat of Doyoung’s mouth and the softness of his tongue as he twirled it around Yuta’s dick. 

"Fuck, you’re so good," Yuta said with a shameless moan, and Doyoung whined. Yuta chased his orgasm hard and fast with his hands tangled in Doyoung’s hair, and when he looked down at Doyoung, whose eyelashes fanned across his cheeks when he blinked and looked back up a red-faced, tear-streaked mess, Yuta buried himself in Doyoung’s mouth and came down his throat. 

The sound that came out of Yuta’s throat was so strained it was silent and choked off at first, finally splintering into a long, loud moan while he held Doyoung’s head to his crotch with both hands and nearly doubled over with how intensely he came. Doyoung clutched at the backs of Yuta’s thighs, squeezing them as Yuta kept coming until he’d finally taken it all and fucking swallowed, too. And when Yuta pulled out, a little dribble of come lingered on Doyoung’s lower lip until Yuta wiped it away with his thumb and brushed Doyoung’s cheeks with the backs of his hands. 

They were both panting, and the shower was silent. Taeil must’ve escaped outside somewhere or put on headphones and fell asleep on the floor. Doyoung noticed at the same time and laughed breathlessly as Yuta collapsed and ran his hands across Doyoung’s back and kissed him. 

"What are we doing?" Doyoung whispered as they crawled over to the bedding that had been laid out on the other side of the room. Yuta was just thinking about whether or not the other members would wonder by tomorrow morning why Doyoung was showering again when he already showered that night. 

"Dunno," Yuta said. He nestled into the blankets and rolled over to Doyoung. It wasn’t out of the ordinary for any one of the boys to cuddle a little bit, though Taeyong and Johnny were usually the only ones who initiated it. Yuta wanted to cuddle, and Doyoung did his best to curl around him.

Doyoung hummed. "Is it okay?" he said, his voice close and gentle.

"Yeah, of course," replied Yuta. 

"Yeah," Doyoung repeated. "It’s okay," he said, as if more trying to convince himself.

"Hey," Yuta said, rolling onto his side so that they were facing each other. Doyoung’s eyes looked tired in the light. "Tell me if it’s never not okay."

"And then what?" said Doyoung, yawning.

"Dunno," said Yuta. "But just— just tell me. And we can go from there."

"Sure," Doyoung said, smacking his lips together tiredly like a dog.

Yuta reached forward and touched Doyoung’s hair, which was stringy and soft, and Yuta found his hand lingering on it. He ran his fingers through it tenderly, and Doyoung closed his eyes. "You promise?"

Doyoung turned his head to kiss Yuta’s hand. "Yeah."

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally going into the 100% pwp folder, but then it got a little out of hand. I like Doyoung and Yuta's dynamics a lot, and I've been wanting to write them for a while. Thank you all so much for reading, and I hope you enjoyed!


End file.
